On 2009/10/01 11:13 (GMT+0200) Stan Goodman composed:
I am trying to install oS v11.1 on a new Dell Vostro 1501 laptop. A problem has arisen that I don't know how to deal with.
I had succeeded in installing the system in partitions that I had made using DFSee. I decided after working with it for a few days that I had made some decisions in the installation options that I now regretted, and decided to repeat the installation from scratch. One of the changes I wanted to make was/is the partitioning scheme.
Here I have to describe exactly how I made the new partitions.
I deleted all the existing partitions, so that the HD was all free space.
Precisely, in detail, how did you delete?
I made the Boot Manager and made it Active. It is located in the MBR.
Please detail what you mean here. "Boot Manager" normally refers to IBM's OS2/eCS boot management system that lives on its own partition, and not the MBR. OTOH, Grub and Lilo are boot managers/boot loaders, which may or may not "live" on the MBR, depending on how they are needed and installed. If IBM BM, Grub or Lilo are installed on a primary partition they either may be or need be set to "active" state, depending on whether standard or non-standard code is or is to be installed in the MBR's code section.
I also made three partitions, for Swap (typr 82), Root and Home (both type 83). There are now no other partitions on the disk. I then started the installation.
When the installer proposes partitioning, it doesn't see the partitions I have made, although I know they are there.
Maybe your new laptop has some new extended BIOS function that saves partitioning data, or expects or prefers GPT partition tables? Was Windows installed when you got it? If so, it likely had GPT, and DFSee may have deleted only the legacy portion of the GPT tables, leaving inconsistency between the "new" tables and the old GPT spare at the end of the disk? Did you cold boot (full power down) between creating partitions and starting the Linux installation program?
It sees the BM primary, the large extended, and five (5) logical partitions, none of which resembles those that I actually made. But what the installer claims to see is exactly what I suggested to it in the earlier installation.
I looked for a way to delete the partition tables, but found only an option to clean them. That didn't help.
What do I have to do to get it to forget the past and live in the present?
Wipe several tracks at the start and end of the disk, or the whole disk. DFSee can do it. So can dd and various other Linux utilities. -- " A patriot without religion . . . is as great a paradox, as an honest man without the fear of God. . . . 2nd U.S. President, John Adams Team OS/2 ** Reg. Linux User #211409 Felix Miata *** http://fm.no-ip.com/ -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org